Well, then, say his name

 There's pushback, doncha know, among the Pubs:

A handful of prominent Republicans . .  were pressed to weigh in on Sunday programs.

Rep.-elect Mike Lawler, R-N.Y., said "Well, obviously, I don’t support that" in an interview on CNN’s "State of the Union."

"The Constitution is set for a reason, to protect the rights of every American. And so I certainly don’t endorse that language or that sentiment. I think the question for everyone is how we move forward," Lawler said, adding that he thinks Americans are “tired of discussing the grievances of prior elections” and that Trump would be “well-advised to focus on the future, if he is going to run for president again.”

Marc Short, former Vice President Mike Pence’s chief of staff, lamented that Trump’s remarks have become a “consistent trend,” pointing out that the former president had demanded that Pence put the Constitution aside to overturn the election results after he lost reelection to Joe Biden.

"The president’s remarks, the company he’s keeping, I think is way beyond the fold,” Short said during an appearance on NBC News’ “Meet the Press.”

Rep. Mike Turner, R-Ohio, similarly dismissed Trump’s call for the termination of the Constitution in an interview on CBS’ “Face the Nation.” He said, “It’s certainly not consistent with the oath we all take."

But Turner sidestepped when asked whether the frontrunner for the GOP nomination in the 2024 election should make such a statement. While he said he “vehemently disagrees” with the former president’s statement, Turner did not directly answer the question, even after host Margaret Brennan pressed repeatedly.

“There is a political process that has to go forward before anyone is a frontrunner or anybody is even a candidate for the party,” Turner said. “And I believe, answering your question, that people certainly are going to take into consideration a statement like this as they evaluate a candidate.”

Rep. David Joyce, R-Ohio, also appeared reluctant to condemn Trump’s remarks during an appearance on ABC News’ “This Week.” 

Joyce said he was unaware of what the former president posted and that “people were not interested in looking backwards” when asked to respond to Trump’s statement.

Pressed on whether he can support a candidate in 2024 who wants to suspend the Constitution, Joyce said that he will choose “whoever the Republican nominee is” because he expects Trump to have many challengers in 2024. He also said the former president lacks the authority to carry out his “fantasy” of suspending the Constitution.

The big dawgs are so far mum:

As of Sunday morning, Republican leaders, including Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., as well as the Republican National Committee had not publicly commented on Trump’s post. NBC News reached out to spokespeople for McConnell, McCarthy and the RNC for comment Saturday but did not receive any response.

This is why I no longer consider myself a Republican. No one in the leadership echelons is willing to speak the entire truth of the matter. In fact, they are all hedging their bets, doing what they can not to jeopardize their political options, given the current still-the-case claim the Very Stable Genius has on the GOP. 

Sorry, can't sign up for that. 

 

 

 

 

Memo to the Arizona GOP: you'd be well-advised to stop your stupid audit

 It's causing a rift among you:

An ongoing and extraordinary audit of the 2020 vote count in the state’s largest county — rooted in conspiracy theories and the false belief that Biden’s election was not legitimate — is deepening the schism six months after the election, with no clear end in sight.

And that has ramifications for upcoming elections:

[Some state] Republicans are speaking out to warn that the amateurish conduct of the audit and the conspiracy theories it has amplified could cause lasting damage to the party. Next year they must defend an open governor’s seat and try to flip back one of the two Senate seats Democrats took in the last two elections.

Instead of a wake-up call spurred by those two Trump-era losses and Biden’s narrow statewide victory, they worry the audit is the latest sign of the Republican Party marginalizing itself in a state where it once reigned supreme.

“First of all, you do need to get to a point where you say, 'Okay, we're done. We have sufficiently addressed concerns that might be out there in the community.' And I feel like we had gotten to that point,” Bill Gates, a Republican Maricopa County supervisor, said in an interview. He said the county’s previous audit and recounts of ballots already determined there were no issues in the election.

“I believe that this is only appealing to a certain segment of the Republican Party,” Gates said. “I think there are many Republicans who are horrified by what's going on. I think there are very few independents who aren't horrified by what's going on. But it's not too late.”

At least one of the firms conducting the audit is a decidedly underbaked, tinfoil-hat outfit:

The audit is being run, in part, by a firm called Cyber Ninjas. The little-known firm is run by a man who has previously promoted baseless conspiracies about the 2020 election and appears to have little past experience in conducting elections or running audits.

“This is not an audit. It’s not even a recount,” said Tammy Patrick, a former Maricopa County elections official who is now a senior adviser at the Democracy Fund. “If we continue to indulge this kind of activity, we will not be living in a true, healthy democracy.”

Then. there is the broader implication. This many people - the majority of Republicans * - continuing to proceed on the basis of a lie about the election being stolen erodes faith in the nation's basic institutions.  A pervasive mistrust in the foundations of our representative democracy cannot lead to anything good. 

*Not that Democrats are immune to jeopardizing our foundations. Stacy Abrams has yet to concede the Georgia governor's race. 

 

 

 

The COVID relief package and HR1: Democrats gonna Democrat

 First of all, it's pretty slick of the Biden administration to hold off on announcing the new CDC guidelines saying that fully vaccinated folks can congregate without masks or social distancing.

Even some of the parts of the $1.9 trillion COVID relief package that actually pertain to effects of the pandemic might have garnered calls for further consideration.

Ah, but those parts were a necessary excuse for the many parts that don't in any way, shape or form qualify as immediately necessary to ameliorate the virus's impact. Take for example the $86 billion for failing pension funds:

Using taxpayer dollars to bail out pension plans is almost unheard-of. Previous proposals to rescue the dying multiemployer plans called for the Treasury to make them 30-year loans, not send them no-strings-attached cash. Other efforts have called for the plans to cut some people’s benefits to conserve their dwindling money — such as widow’s pensions, early retirement subsidies and pensions promised by companies that subsequently left their pools.

That's just part of the grab bag of unrelated goodies:

One analysis by the Center for a Responsible Federal Budget found that more than 15% of the proposed package — about $300 billion — will go toward long-standing policy priorities that are "not directly related to the current crisis." Roughly 1% of the spending will go toward accelerating vaccine distribution, and just 5% is focused on public health needs, according to the nonpartisan group.

 

“The goal of COVID relief is to end the pandemic, protect incomes, and support the economic recovery," said Maya MacGuineas, president of the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget. "The House bill not only spends far more than is needed to achieve these goals, but also puts too many of these plentiful dollars in the wrong places."

Some of the most expensive aspects of the bill include $422 billion for the latest round of cash payments and $350 billion for state and local governments — which MacGuineas described as "poorly targeted.”

"Nearly half of the package will be spent on poorly targeted rebate checks and state and local government aid, including to households and governments that have experienced little or no financial loss during this crisis," she said.

New research published by Opportunity Insights, a nonpartisan policy institute based at Harvard University, laid out evidence that the money would be most effective at boosting the U.S. economy if it targeted lower-income Americans.

Then there is the For The People Act, also known as HR1, which is an egregious expansion of federal power over a realm of activity the Framers envisioned as chiefly the purview of the states. 

Jay Caruso of the Washington Examiner, discussing it on Twitter, points up some its most insidious aspects:

Jay Caruso

@JayCaruso

Replying to 

@JayCaruso

For example, it would establish at the federal level, redistricting commissions for all states with required reporting on the "diversity" of those commissions. It allows minors to register to vote. It sets federal standards for manual and paper ballot requirements and 2/

Jay Caruso

@JayCaruso

Replying to 

@JayCaruso

paper ballot printing requirements. It wipes out any voter identification laws, mandating that a sworn statement is sufficient. It mandates curbside voting. It sets conditions for cleaning up voter registration rolls. It also includes the ridiculous DISCLOSE Act requirements. 3/

National Review minces no words in its editorial about it:

It would be an understatement to describe H.R. 1 as a radical assault on American democracy, federalism, and free speech. It is actually several radical left-wing wish lists stuffed into a single 791-page sausage casing. It would override hundreds of state laws governing the orderly conduct of elections, federalize control of voting and elections to a degree without precedent in American history, end two centuries of state power to draw congressional districts, turn the Federal Elections Commission into a partisan weapon, and massively burden political speech against the government while offering government handouts to congressional campaigns and campus activists. Merely to describe the bill is to damn it, and describing it is a Herculean task in itself.

That's sure a markedly different take than one finds in the piece by Justin Florence and Rachel Homer at The Bulwark:

. . . it’s neither a progressive nor partisan bill—it’s a pro-democracy bill that should appeal to Americans of all political backgrounds.

So before the next stage of the debate begins in earnest, let’s open the hood and take a look at what’s actually in the bill.

Broadly speaking, H.R. 1 covers three major areas: voting and elections, campaign finance, and ethics.

First, it would:

• reduce barriers that keep eligible citizens from registering to vote and then casting their vote;
• set minimum, uniform standards for elections; and
• provide funding to increase the security of our elections.

These reforms have a long record of bipartisan support and have already been implemented across many states.

Second, H.R. 1 would increase the transparency of spending on elections and campaign ads and strengthen protections against foreign interference in our campaigns.

Third is ethics: Requiring increased disclosure of lobbying activities, and putting into law ethical guidelines preventing conflicts of interest by staff, appointees, members of Congress, and even presidents.

So those are the broad strokes of what the bill aims to do. 

Pretty benign in their telling of it. But consider that Florence's resume includes a stint working for Sheldon Whitehouse and Homer's includes some time on Al Franken's staff. 

The Bulwark gets into some shaky territory sometimes.  I've never understood why they run the work of Richard North Patterson, who is an overt fan of all manner of lefty policy. Then there was Bill Kristol's "What About Joe?" piece a couple of weeks ago. It often gets lumped in with The3 Dispatch, but it seems tp be proving to be a different kind of critter.

In any event, these two pieces of legislation make it clear that neither the Biden administration nor Congressional Democrats are interested in that unity stuff they spouted in the early days of their assuming office. 

 One thing The Bulwark has been right about - as has The Dispatch, Principles First and a handful of other outlets and organizations (two of which, I'd like to think, are Late in the Day and Precipice) - is that Trumpism and neo-Trumpsim are of no use in countering the Left's agenda. 

Actual conservatives must stand up. This shouldn't be complicated. 

 

The Georgia rally: as toxic as you'd anticipated

If you'd held out some kind of hope against hope that the VSG was going to do some growing up between Saturday night and last night, that maybe reaction to the phone call to Raffensperger was going to have some kind of upside-the-head effect, and that maybe if he wanted to salvage some kind of positive legacy while he still has an opportunity, it was dashed in Dalton:

The first words out of his mouth at the rally in Dalton were: "There's no way we lost Georgia. That was a rigged election."

Trump went on to bash Kemp and Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, claim they were not real Republicans and vow to campaign against both men when they stand for reelection in 2022.

The president also falsely claimed that he had won reelection "in a landslide" and suggested that he expects Vice President Mike Pence to make it so when he fulfills his constitutional duty to preside over Wednesday's joint session of Congress, even though the vice president does not actually have the power to overturn the results.

"I hope Mike Pence comes through for us, I have to tell you," Trump told the applauding Georgia crowd. "Of course, if he doesn't come through, I won't like him quite as much."

GOP strategists say Trump's infatuation with personal grievances and false claims of a "rigged" and "stolen" election in November could depress their party's turnout Tuesday, dooming Republicans David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler.

Georgia's voting systems manager, Gabriel Sterling, refuted Trump's voter fraud claims point by point at a news conference Monday in Atlanta. "This is all easily, provably false, yet the president persists," Sterling said. "We have claim after claim after claim, with zero proof. Zero."

Trump has been uninterested in governing or managing the pandemic - or even burnishing his legacy - and is almost entirely focused on the election, spending considerable time talking about it with White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows and Johnny McEntee, the presidential personnel director, officials said.

To those who have attended these rallies, in full MAGA regalia, who have participated in Trump Train parades through their communities, who have defended this pathetic figure vociferously in social media comment threads, focusing on the few laudable policy moves - judicial appointments, deregulation, pulling out of the Paris climate accord and the JCPOA, moving the embassy to Jerusalem - which are moves we could have had with an actual conservative grownup* - while dismissing his glaring unfitness, you still may not be able to hear this, but it bears repeating: Donald Trump does not love America. He has no understanding of the foundations of this country, such as the Constitution and free-market economics. He doesn't care about you as a voter or a citizen. All that crap about bringing jobs and robust economic activity back to your communities was utter hooey. He was blowing smoke. You've been useful to him only because of your slavish loyalty. 

He's on the way out now. Give up that loyalty. He hasn't earned it. Take a square look at how you've been used and betrayed. Get reacquainted with the conservative impulses that motivated you to give him a look in the first place. And then resolve to never squander your devotion on such a solipsistic man-child again.

*I still speak of "actual conservatives" among the 2016 Republican presidential candidates, but perhaps I, too, am harboring an unfounded hope. Most have since showed themselves to be all too willing to jettison their supposed principles out of fear that the VSG had so thoroughly made the GOP his own that they had to cast their lot with him. I remain convinced - why I'm not sure - that conservatives who cannot be subsumed by a movement like Trumpism are out there. Adam Kinzinger and Ben Sasse continue to impress me, as does Larry Hogan. I am greatly relieved to see that Tom Cotton in not going to join this plan to disrupt electoral-vote-counting day. 

"Find"

 Of the angles that the Very Stable Genius tried during his Saturday phone call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, from extortion ("it's gonna be costly to you") to an appeal to Raffensperger to gloss over niceties such as certified election numbers ("There's nothing wrong with you saying that, you know, that you've recalculated") to begging ("Fellas, I need 11,000 votes. Give me a break"), what has stuck in my mind is the use of the word "find," as in "find 11,780 votes."

It is so inconceivable to the VSG that he really lost that he'll pressure people to pull the imaginary set of circumstances he's looking for out of thin air.

It all sheds a bit of new light on the impeachment proceedings of a year ago and the way the VSG had behaved toward the Ukraine president in the previous summer's phone call on which impeachment was predicated. 

Exit question: Do 11 Senators and 140 House members still intend to cause chaos on electoral-votes-counting day, in the wake of this astonishing conversation?

Are they still willing to hitch their wagons to this figure who, daily, ensures an-ever-less-favorable assessment by history of his time in this office?

16 days out from inauguration and we have a full-blown constitutional crisis on our hands. 

Because the VSG is a big baby with a dangerous amount of power.

Donald Trump has no qualms or regrets about having ruined the Republican Party

 It has never been about ideas, principles or coherent policy for the Very Stable Genius. If it had been, he'd take a look at the present situation and say to himself, well, I won't be there to shepherd the initiatives I'm passionate about, but I can apply my energies to seeing that the Senate retains a Republican majority.

But since his sole motivation his entire pathetic life has been self-glorification, he intends to burn it all down on his way out of DC:

President Donald Trump declared the Senate runoff elections in Georgia both “illegal and invalid” in a tweet on Friday, which could dissuade his followers from heading to the polls.

The results of the Jan. 5 vote will determine which party controls the Senate. More than 3 million Georgians have already voted during the state’s early voting period.

Trump issued his baseless conclusion in a Twitter thread Friday night when he attacked the election process in the state, which is controlled by Republicans.

In his slam, Trump wrote that the Georgia “consent decree” is “unconstitutional.” He was referring to a bipartisan agreement forged by election officials in March that helped establish standards for judging valid signatures on absentee ballots. Lawsuits challenging the decree on Trump’s behalf have failed.

“The Georgia Consent Decree is Unconstitutional & the State 2020 Presidential Election ... is therefore both illegal and invalid, and that would include the two current Senatorial Elections,” Trump tweeted.

And let us mention the larger point as well: He intends to do as much damage as possible to the American public's faith in bedrock institutions as possible. 

All that flag-hugging was for the benefit of the drooling, zombie-eyed cult followers. He doesn't give the first diddly about this nation. 

Their avenues for staying relevant are getting fewer

 More people and institutions are getting it all the time.

The New York Post gets it:

You had every right to investigate the election. But let’s be clear: Those efforts have found nothing. To take just two examples: Your campaign paid $3 million for a recount in two Wisconsin counties, and you lost by 87 more votes. Georgia did two recounts of the state, each time affirming Biden’s win. These ballots were counted by hand, which alone debunks the claims of a Venezuelan vote-manipulating Kraken conspiracy.

Sidney Powell is a crazy person. Michael Flynn suggesting martial law is tantamount to treason. It is shameful.

We understand, Mr. President, that you’re angry that you lost. But to continue down this road is ruinous. We offer this as a newspaper that endorsed you, that supported you: If you want to cement your influence, even set the stage for a future return, you must channel your fury into something more productive.

Stop thinking about Jan. 6. Start thinking about Jan. 5.

Louie Gohmert and Josh Hawley still don't get it.

Michael Flynn . . . well, just what is going on with that cat?

Former Trump National Security Adviser Michael Flynn is going all in on the QAnon conspiracy theory, promoting an online store to sell QAnon hats and T-shirts, the proceeds of which will benefit his partnership with a prominent QAnon booster.

Flynn’s drawn-out legal battle with Special Counsel Robert Mueller turned him into a hero for QAnon believers. Many QAnon supporters, who rely on mysterious online clues to construct a worldview where the Democratic Party and other institutions are controlled by a cabal of pedophile-cannibals, claim that Flynn is “Q”, the anonymous figure behind the conspiracy theory. They also took a previously obscure Flynn quote about the American military’s “digital soldiers” as their banner, adopting the phrase to refer to QAnon believers themselves.

Flynn started to more aggressively court his QAnon fans this year, taking the “QAnon oath” in July and appearing on QAnon podcasts after receiving a pardon in November. Along the way, Flynn once again became an adviser to Trump, reportedly urging the president to impose martial law in a recent, heated Oval Office meeting.

The Very Stable Genius obviously still doesn't get it. True to form, he disseminates an utter falsehood because he can't be bothered with a simple fact check:

Republican Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger does not have a brother named Ron who works for a Chinese tech firm, regardless of what the president of the United States says.

In a late-night tweet, President Donald Trump attacked Gov. Brian Kemp and Raffensperger for failing to overturn election results in his favor and claimed that "Brad R's brother works for China." Except, that's not true.

On Dec. 23, GPB News reported on the "Battleground" blog and on social media that Brad and Ron were not related, that Raffensperger had two sisters and no brother in debunking the claims made by the Gateway Pundit and other right-wing media outlets seeking to allege nefarious actions that somehow altered election results.

And the VSG clearly has Georgia on his mind lately. He's calling for this:

President Trump called for Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp’s (R) resignation on Wednesday, hammering him for refusing to back up the president’s claim that he carried Georgia in the November presidential election — despite his loss by 12,000 votes, a result that has survived multiple recounts and court challenges.

“@BrianKempGA should resign from office,” Trump tweeted. “He is an obstructionist who refuses to admit that we won Georgia, BIG! Also won the other Swing States.”

I mean, look, buddy. You're still getting paid to hold the office. It would be a damn sight better for your legacy for you to earn your keep by leading on the pandemic and the Russian cyber-attack than to whine your way into complete irrelevance. 

Are you listening to me? 

 

 

Glimmers of hope that not every last Republican office-holder in post-America is up to his or her eyeballs in Kool-Aid

 The ruinous side of the divide among Republicans regarding shady-as-hell Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton's bizarre and futile lawsuit seeking to overturn election results in Georgia, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Wisconsin has been getting the preponderance of the attention so far. The 16 other attorneys general who have signed on, the 106 House members who have endorsed it, and this weekend's Stop The Steal rally in Washington, headlined by Michael Flynn - the Michael Flynn who retweeted the call for martial law.

There are now signs of principled opposition to this madness coming from figures with Rs behind their names, or established connection to what was once recognizably the Party of Lincoln and Reagan.

Some attorneys general are speaking out.

Such is the case in Idaho, where the AG is not at all on board:

Idaho's Republican attorney general, Lawrence Wasden, issued a statementdistancing himself from Paxton's case, saying: "I am declining to join this effort. As is sometimes the case, the legally correct decision may not be the politically convenient decision. But my responsibility is to the State of Idaho and the rule of law."

Down in Texas, Senator John Cornyn's stance puts him at odds with Paxton and the state's other Senator (Ted Cruz, someone I once greatly admired and regarded as the hope for the GOP's future, but who has since those days proven himself to be a coward and a boot-licker):

On Wednesday, Sen. John Cornyn of Texas signaled a contrast with the Texas attorney general and Cruz. Cornyn told CNN: "I read just the summary of it, and I frankly struggle to understand the legal theory of it."

Cornyn added, "Number one, why would a state, even such a great state as Texas, have a say-so on how other states administer their elections?"

Among House members from Texas showing some spine is Chip Roy:

Rep. Chip Roy of Texas said he wouldn't sign on and publicly called the brief "a dangerous violation of federalism" that he said "will almost certainly fail."

The Very Stable Genius tried to strong-arm the Georgia AG for his stance:

Georgia's attorney general, Chris Carr, split with the Trump camp as well, telling The Atlanta Journal-Constitution that the lawsuit was "constitutionally, legally, and factually wrong." The paper reported that his public stance Wednesday was met with a fiery 15-minute phone call in which Trump asked Carr not to rally other Republicans against the suit.

The Orlando Sentinel got one of those reality checks like the above-mentioned on I got concerting Ted Cruz: 

We apologize to our readers for endorsing Michael Waltz in the 2020 general election for Congress.

We had no idea, had no way of knowing at the time, that Waltz was not committed to democracy.

During our endorsement interview with the incumbent congressman, we didn’t think to ask, “Would you support an effort to throw out the votes of tens of millions of Americans in four states in order to overturn a presidential election and hand it to the person who lost, Donald Trump?” 

Our bad.

 Waltz, to our horror, was one of the 10 Florida Republican members of Congress who, on Thursday, signed up to support a lawsuit brought by Texas in the U.S. Supreme Court that’s attempting to throw out the election results in Georgia, Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania — all states where Donald Trump lost to Joe Biden. 

Trust us, some variation of that question will be asked of anyone running for Congress in the future, particularly Republican candidates whose party is attempting to upend the way we choose a president.

Now, a couple of items that are not about the immediate subject at hand, but demonstrate that, as hard as it tried, Trumpism did not stomp out sound reasoning among Republicans and conservative thinkers.

Townhall.com, which has, in the last five years nearly completely given itself over to Very Stable Genius cult worship, every one in a while runs a column by a sane grownup, surely still contractually able to state clear truths that run counter to the narrative about various matters. Such is the case with Veronique deRugy's latest, exposing Trump's protectionism for the garbage economic policy that it is:

President Donald Trump may soon be departing Washington, so now is a great time to assess his protectionist trade policies. From tariffs to his hectic bullying of other governments to renegotiate trade agreements to his support for American export subsidies, the Trump years were more than infuriating on trade matters; they were destructive.

This harsh conclusion is no surprise to those of us who understand international trade. We realized from the start that the president's trade philosophy is the mercantilist one that Adam Smith debunked nearly 250 years ago.

For instance, Trump believes that the success of U.S. trade policy is best gauged with a trade-balance scorecard -- the notion that trade deficits are bad and trade surpluses are good. For this reason, he believes that the ultimate benefit of trading lies in the amounts that we export, while imports are to be feared and kept to a minimum. But Trump's understanding is backward. After all, exports are what we produce for foreigners, while imports are what foreigners produce for us.

 

Early on in his administration, Trump raised tariffs. The Cato Institute's Scott Lincicome describes the president's trade war as having "implemented five different tariff actions on almost $400 billion in annual U.S. imports (as of 2018) under three different laws with different rationales: 'safeguards,' 'national security,' and 'unfair trade.'" We were promised ever-more jobs thanks to the tariffs. But as numerous academic studies have shown, the people who shouldered nearly all of the burden of these import taxes were not foreigners but, rather, Americans.

Protectionism reduces the overall wealth of the nation. Aside from a few favored and protected producers, Americans, in general, are made poorer. Consumers have to spend a higher share of their incomes to buy goods that they could otherwise get for less. As a result, ordinary Americans save less and have less to spend -- even on nontariffed goods and services. The American producers of goods that use tariffed foreign inputs also see their production costs driven up, which drives their ability to compete down. 

Unsurprisingly, the administration's belligerent trade policies disturbed our trading partners. They retaliated with their own tariffs on American exports (to the detriment of their consumers). Adding insult to injury, the president's erratic behavior, threats and contradictory tweets about his trade policy likely spooked investors. The overall uncertainty and negative effects of the trade disputes surely dampened the beneficial effects of the president's few good fiscal policies and regulatory reforms. 

And, getting back to signs of clear thinking and integrity in the Senate, Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe is not feeling the giddiness over the latest peace agreement between Israel and an Arab nation:

Sen. Jim Inhofe berated the Trump administration Thursday for recognizing Morocco’s claim over the disputed Western Sahara region, as part of a broader deal to normalize relations between Israel and Morocco. 

In floor remarks and a written statement, the chair of the Senate Armed Services Committee described the White House’s decision as “shocking and deeply disappointing,” adding that he was “saddened that the rights of the Western Sahara people have been traded away.”

“The president has been poorly advised by his team,” Inhofe said. “He could have made this deal without trading the rights of a voiceless people."

I don't know that we can conclude from all of the above that the Republican Party can be salvaged, but these are voices that ought to be welcomed into the conversation about how conservatism repairs itself after the Trumpist infection has been neutralized. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The irony is rich; the Supreme Court that Trump had much to do with shaping has stuck to its guns and denied Trump and his cult a challenge to the Pennsylvania election

 This is just too good. Trumpists, trying to pose as conservatives and appeal to them, have, since 2015, harped, over and over, on the theme that the Very Stable Genius would get us principled, originalist federal judges, particularly at the SCOTUS level.

And, indeed, that is just how it's played out. 

They've behaved in a principled manner.

And that's how this decision came down today:

The Supreme Court refused Tuesday to stop Pennsylvania from finalizing President-elect Joe Biden's victory in the state despite allegations from allies of President Donald Trump that the expansion of mail-in voting was illegal .

The action by the nation's highest court, which includes three justices named by Trump, came as states across the country are locking in the results that will lead to next week's Electoral College vote. It represented the latest in a string of stinging judicial opinions that have left the president defeated both politically and legally.

By their one-sentence denial, the justices left intact a ruling by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, which said the challenge to a state law passed in 2019 came far too late. New Associate Justice Amy Coney Barrett appeared to have participated in the case; no dissents or recusals were noted.

Led by conservative Rep. Mike Kelly, R-Pa., the challengers claimed that the Republican-led state legislature's expansion of absentee voting violated the Pennsylvania Constitution. Rather than going to court after its passage, however, they waited until the state figured prominently in Trump's loss to Biden last month.

As a Never Trumper, I have to say I'm delighted that the only thing he was ever going to be good for has borne fruit. 

It has to be an extra pinch of salt in the wounds of all the throne-sniffers who thought they were belittling us with taunts of "but muh principles."

Turns out principles get vindicated - sometimes sooner, sometimes later - but worship of charlatans doesn't. 

 

The Krebs firing

 One more conclusive example of how the Very Stable Genius prioritizes his fragile ego over national security:

President Trump took to Twitter late Tuesday to fire his top cybersecurity official via tweet for not toeing the line on his “rigged” election narrative.

“The recent statement by Chris Krebs on the security of the 2020 Election was highly inaccurate, in that there were massive improprieties and fraud - including dead people voting, Poll Watchers not allowed into polling locations, ‘glitches’ in the voting machines which changed votes from Trump to Biden, late voting, and many more. Therefore, effective immediately, Chris Krebs has been terminated as Director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency,” Trump declared.

Krebs, who had set up a web page to counter disinformation about the security of the election, had reportedly been expecting to be fired after becoming one of the few in Trump’s administration to dispute his claims.

He reacted to his termination with a brief statement on his personal Twitter account: “Honored to serve. We did it right. Defend Today, Secure Tomorrow.”

His firing comes as more and more of the president’s allegations of voting discrepancies fall apart in court. Just hours before Krebs’ ouster on Tuesday, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled against the Trump campaign’s claims that observers were not able to properly monitor absentee vote-counting.

GOP Throws More Crap at the Wall as Trump Legal Losses Pile Up

While the president has repeatedly tried to sound the alarm over supposed voting discrepancies that he claims robbed him of victory in the Nov. 3 election, officials have said there is no evidence to back up his assertions. Even the Trump campaign’s own lawyers, in their legal blitz to prevent the certification of Joe Biden’s victory, have struggled to present evidence of a “rigged” election in court; many of their legal challenges alleging voter fraud have collapsed when judges grilled them on their claims. In some cases, the evidence was deemed to be hearsay gathered via a “voter fraud” website. In others, Trump campaign lawyers admitted under questioning that observers were not blocked from monitoring the vote count as the complaint alleged.

Lawmakers responded to news of Krebs’ termination with praise for his work in protecting the election.

“Chris Krebs is a dedicated public servant who has done a remarkable job during a challenging time,” Sen. Richard Burr (R-NC) said in a statement. He went on to say the work of Krebs and his CISA team “should serve as a model for other government agencies” and was “essential in protecting the 2020 U.S. presidential election against threats of foreign interference.”

Reps. Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS) and Lauren Underwood (D-IL) issued a joint statement calling Trump’s firing of Krebs “disturbing” and “antidemocratic.”

“The fact is that, since Election Day, President Trump has sought to delegitimize the election results by engaging in a disinformation campaign that could shatter public confidence in our elections for generations. Director Krebs put national security ahead of politics and refused to use his position to do the President’s bidding, so the President fired him,” they said.

“In firing Director Krebs for refusing to lend credibility to his baseless claims and conspiracy theories about voter fraud, the President is telling officials throughout the Administration to put his political interests ahead of their responsibilities to the American people.”

This, of course, comes on the heels of Trump's firing of Defense Secretary Mark Esper, a move during what should be a transition period, characteristically a time of relative wobbliness. This vulnerability does not go unnoticed in the world:

Even under the best of circumstances, a presidential transition "is a period when we aren't necessarily firing on all cylinders in terms of the people and processes that manage national security issues for the nation, which creates that sense of heightened vulnerability," Nick Rasmussen, a former head of the National Counterterrorism Center, told NBC News.

"This particular move today creates concern and uncertainty because there are already concerns about the president's decision-making style and what he might do in the remaining days of his presidency," he said.

We also must include as part of the context for the Krebs termination the abrupt drawdown of US troops in Afghanistan. The manner in which that is being proposed has raised concerns:

In a rare rebuke of Donald Trump, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has warned that the outgoing administration’s planned drawdown of troops in Afghanistan would “hand a weakened and scattered al-Qaeda a big, big propaganda victory and a renewed safe haven for plotting attacks against America.”

Mr McConnell couched his warnings about the hazards of an Afghanistan troop withdrawal in a speech on the Senate floor on Monday in more general praise for Mr Trump’s foreign policy achievements over the last four years. But the recently re-elected majority leader’s comments fit a larger pattern of pushing back — gently — against the president’s most anti-interventionist instincts in the Middle East.

“A disorganized retreat would jeopardize the track record of major successes this administration has worked hard to compile” in the region, Mr McConnell said on Monday.

Still, at this late date, this dangerously unfit buffoon has slavish devotees who are perpetuating his delusions and indulging his impulses. Townhall, American Greatness, The Federalist, OANN, Newsmax TV and the wilds of after-8 PM FNC are determined to ride the Trump Train all the way over the cliff.

It's time for actual conservatives to turn around and step back onto solid ground. There's not a moment to lose in beginning the process of rebuilding an understanding among thoughtful Americans as to what the immutable principles informing our positions are.

We'll just have to hope for the best during eight more weeks of winging it in place of coherent policy.  

 

 

 

The GOP is actually positioned fairly well at the moment, but the remaining Trumpists decide to act suicidally

 Look, you knuckleheads, the makeup of the Senate depends on the two runoff races in Georgia. This is no time to be harassing that state's secretary of state based on your desperate delusions of the VSG still having a chance:

Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger said Monday that he has come under increasing pressure in recent days from fellow Republicans, including Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, to question the validity of legally cast absentee ballots in an effort to reverse President Donald Trump's narrow loss in the state.

In a wide-ranging interview about the election, Raffensperger expressed exasperation over a string of baseless allegations coming from Trump and his allies about the integrity of the Georgia results, including claims that Dominion Voting Systems, the Colorado-based manufacturer of Georgia's voting machines, is a "leftist" company with ties to Venezuela that engineered thousands of Trump votes to be left out of the count.

The atmosphere has grown so contentious, Raffensperger said, that both he and his wife, Tricia, have received death threats in recent days, including a text to him that read: "You better not botch this recount. Your life depends on it."

"Other than getting you angry, it's also very disillusioning," Raffensperger said of the threats, "particularly when it comes from people on my side of the aisle. Everyone that is working on this needs to elevate their speech. We need to be thoughtful and careful about what we say." He said he reported the threats to state authorities.

Answer this honestly, leg-humpers: Is this about shoring up the prospects for the advance of conservative principles and policies, or going to any lengths to demonstrate your devotion to the most unfit president in US history?

 

 

True to form, the Very Stable Genius is fouling his own nest once again

I realize that polls show the majority of Americans think that filling the Supreme Court vacancy ought to wait until next year. There are respectable arguments for that position. 

I've concluded otherwise. After much deliberation, I've concluded that the nomination of an originalist judge - hopefully Amy Coney Barrett - and hearings (if the Senate deems them absolutely necessary; if the nominee's public evisceration in that forum can be avoided, that would be good) and confirmation should occur before Election Day, and let the chips fall where they may. 

Mind you, it won't happen in a vacuum, though. Washington Dems as well as radicals on the streets will be at maximum meltdown. 

As far as this being some kind of dastardly move, it is no such thing. There's plenty of precedent for this situation (Congress controlled by one party, the White House controlled by the other).

More importantly, there are only two laws covering this situation, both of them in the Constitution. All else is posturing and politics.

Amy Coney Barrett is a brilliant jurist and a human being of great depth. She would be excellent. I had hoped Trump would choose her when he went with Kavanaugh instead. She'd be an incredible asset on the Supreme Court.

But, true to his cycle of making one laudable move and ruining it with three or four boneheaded moves, the VSG is sullying what should be a win for conservatism by casting doubt on the election process:

President Donald Trump reiterated Thursday that he may not honor the results should he lose reelection, reaffirming his extraordinary refusal to commit to a peaceful transition of power and prompting election and law enforcement authorities nationwide to prepare for an unprecedented constitutional crisis.

Trump escalated his months-long campaign to undermine the legitimacy of the Nov. 3 election with a series of comments Wednesday that, taken together and at face value, pose his most substantial threat yet to the nation's history of free and fair elections.

In recent days, the president cast doubt on the integrity of vote totals. He said he might not accept the results if they show him losing to Democratic nominee Joe Biden. He said it was imperative to quickly fill the Supreme Court vacancy created by the death of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg because the nation's high court could determine the winner of the election.

And when asked directly whether he would commit to a "peaceful transition of power," Trump responded, "We're going to have to see what happens." He went on to suggest that authorities "get rid of the ballots," an apparent reference to the huge uptick in votes cast by mail amid the coronavirus pandemic, adding that, if they did, "there won't be a transfer [of power], frankly. There will be a continuation."

Trump reaffirmed his views Thursday, saying on Fox News Radio that he would agree with a Supreme Court ruling that Biden won the election but that short of a court decision, the vote count would amount to "a horror show" because of fraudulent ballots. There is no evidence of widespread fraud.

Later Thursday, as he left the White House for a campaign rally in North Carolina, Trump reiterated to reporters, "We want to make sure the election is honest, and I'm not sure that it can be."

The Left will paint this scenario as Trump being solely motivated by wanting a conservative SCOTUS majority to settle any uncertainty surrounding the election - and they may well be right.

Two things about that:

Barrett, or whoever the nominee is, must make very clear - and this would be one useful thing about hearings - that she or he will not be leaned upon by the VSG or anyone else, and will consult the Constitution and the Constitution only in deciding any matters related to the election

Donald Trump would be wise to shut his damn mouth. But I'm indulging unrealistic hopes here. The VSG never does wise.

 

Post Office funny business

 Maybe it's because there's a growing reluctance in our society to have one's take on something be revealed as an unfounded conspiracy theory that the current set of developments involving the US Postal Service are still being treated as if it were enshrouded in mystery.

But consider the deactivation of several mail-sorting machines at centers around the country. Or the reduction in the number of national service areas from seven to four. Or the change to the core postal service principle of getting every piece of mail delivered every day. 

And consider the person now at the helm, the one implementing these changes:

Before joining the administration, DeJoy, a Trump ally and fundraiser, was on the board of directors at XPO Logistics, a large transportation and logistics company that does business with the USPS and has contracts with other US government agencies, such as the Department of Defense. In 2014, XPO acquired DeJoy's company, New Breed Logistics, for $615 million. 

These questions about DeJoy come at a time of incredible strain at USPS. The agency is already strapped for cash and facing funding shortages. And two members of the board of governors quit earlier this year, at least in part to protest efforts by Trump aides to control USPS finances and operations. DeJoy's supporters say he's the right person for the job because he can streamline the struggling agency with his business expertise.

When announcing DeJoy's appointment, the USPS board of governors noted that New Breed "was a contractor to the U.S. Postal Service for more than 25 years," and received awards for high quality in the 1990s. The announcement didn't mention XPO's ongoing ties to the USPS. 

According to federal records, when he became postmaster general, DeJoy still owned a large equity stake in XPO, totaling between $30 million and $75 million. Federal ethics officials recently approved his decision to keep these assets, but outside experts with decades of experience in government are raising red flags. 

"The idea that you can be a postmaster general and hold tens of millions in stocks in a postal service contractor is pretty shocking," said Walter Shaub, the former director of the Office of Government Ethics, who resigned in 2017. "It could be that he's planning on selling it, but I don't understand the delay. He has managed to divest a lot of other things. And if he wasn't prepared to sell that off, he shouldn't have taken the job."

Schaub, who is now a senior adviser at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, suggested that if DeJoy doesn't divest his holdings soon, it could be construed as an illegal conflict of interest. Schaub also questioned why the ethics officials approved this arrangement. 

It's illegal under federal law for federal government employees or their spouses to have a "financial interest" in companies that intersect with their official duties. The ethics experts who spoke to CNN said DeJoy could have mitigated these conflicts by divesting, agreeing upfront to recuse himself from some matters, receiving legal waivers, or even establishing a blind trust. 

"If you have a $30 million interest in a company, of course it's going to impact you," said Stuart Gilman, who spent 12 years at the Office of Government Ethics, where he was the assistant director. "I would assume that there is a problem here. It certainly doesn't pass the smell test."

Or consider the Very Stable Genius's response, particularly ineptly delivered, to Maria Bartiromo, on Fox Business this morning. It's one of his classic word salads, but it doesn't really take too much parsing to get to what he really means: that he has the USPS by the short hairs and is not going to get them the funds they'll need to process mail-in ballots this fall:

During an interview on Fox Business, host Maria Bartiromo asked Trump what Democrats are pushing in the coronavirus stimulus package that was causing the negotiations to be held up. He replied, “It’s their fault. They want 3-and-a-half billion dollars for something that will turn out to be fraudulent. That’s election money, basically.”

“They want 3-and-a-half billion dollars for the mail-in votes. Universal mail-in ballots, 3-and-a-half… They want $25 billion — billion — for the post office. Now, they need that money in order to have the post office work so it can take all of these millions and millions of ballots,” he explained, adding, “Now, in the meantime, they aren’t getting there.”

“By the way, those are just two items, but if they don’t get those two items, that means you can’t have universal mail-in voting because they’re not equipped to have it,” Trump went on, before remarking, “And you’ve seen how bad it’s been with this Caroline Malone scam. She scammed her way into an election. She probably lost but they said mail-in ballots, it’s all mixed up. Paterson, New Jersey, same thing.”

“Yesterday, Virginia, 500,000 applications for ballots got sent to everybody, nobody even knows. Got sent to dogs, got sent to dead people. Nobody has no idea what happened. They say, ‘Oh, we made a mistake, I’m sorry.’ 500,000 ballots sent in Virginia,” he said. “How do you feel about Virginia going in there and you have 500,000 phony ballot applications, and this is all over.”

Bartiromo responded, “Wow, so this is what’s holding it up?… This is what’s holding up money for the American people? They want mail-in voting and they want money for the post office? This is one of the sticking points that’s holding back stimulus for Americans during this coronavirus?”

“That’s one of them,” Trump answered. “How would you like to have 3-and-a-half billion dollars — billion — for mail-in voting? Billion… You know how much money that is? Nobody has any idea… They want $25 billion for the post office because the post office is going to have to go to town to get these ridiculous ballots in.”

“You know, there’s nothing wrong with getting out and voting. You get out and vote. They voted during World War I and World War II and they should have voter ID because the Democrats scammed the system. But two of the items are the post office and the 3-and-a-half billion dollars for mail-in voting,” he concluded. “Now, if we don’t make a deal, that means they don’t get the money. That means they can’t have universal mail-in voting. They just can’t have it.”

He was no doubt trying to sound as minimally autocratic as possible, but he's not an adept enough communicator to pull it off.

Yes, the Postal Service has some chronic problems that predate this confluence of a pandemic and an election cycle, but an orderly and secure mail-in voting option could be implemented if all parties involved were on the same page. 

Some folks think "but we're crowding into bars and reopening sports stadiums" is a gotcha rejoinder. Here's the difference: People have other options for things they'd do with a chunk of time not spent in a bar or a stadium. Some people - probably a lot of people - will indeed line up at their local polling place the first Tuesday of November. But they ought to have the option of an alternative means of voting in this extraordinary time. 

It can be done. 

If there's a truly strong argument why it shouldn't be, someone who can communicate like a composed adult will have to make it. The VSG's gobbledygook wasn't convincing.